NBR.MAR - Ortegas vs Redchapel Gang 25ss

[Sholto]

Murder At Mulestop

The town of Mulestop was isolated, ramshackle and completely deserted.

In Malifaux, none of those were particularly unusual, but Perdita Ortega of the Guild had it on good authority that there should have been a dozen or so hardy souls scratching a living there. Smoke drifting from the blacksmith's chimney told her it had been in use earlier in the day, as did the freshly chopped firewood stacked outside the store. But there was nothing moving, not even a dog to bark as she and her family emerged from the woods.

Something was wrong, and Francisco was the first to give it a name.

"Seamus," he said, spitting out the corner of his mouth. "He's been here. I can smell the dog."

"Clara, mi hermanito," Perdita agreed softly, and then held up one long-fingered hand to halt Nino and Santiago, who were about to advance into the town. There was something else about the silence, about the light and the shadows.

To most people, Malifaux's strangely dim sun was just another reason to feel ill at ease in this oddest of places but, to Perdita, the rhythms of this world were written in the uncanny blackness of the shadows at noon and the thin veil that hung over even the strongest sunlight. They were pages she could read better than any book.

"He still is," she said, shifting her weight into a pistolier's stance. She put the fate of the townsfolk from her mind – Seamus' crimes were legion, and only El Diablo's tallyman kept his score now.

A litany of swearing hissed from the man standing beside her, and she reached out, taking his trembling hand and placing it on her long, dark hair. She needed him if she was to face Seamus, but she needed him calm. The swearing, and the shaking, subsided as the rough hand gently stroked her hair. "Papa," she said, soothingly.

"Mi tesoro," her father muttered, his pet name for her since as long as she could remember.

"Not long now, papa." Then, to Francisco: "Call him out. See if he's made anything for us to play with."

Francisco stepped forward and his snarl shattered the uncanny quiet. "Seamus! The Guild has come for you and yours, Seamus! Show your hand!"

For a moment there was nothing but the soft wind, and then a high pitched giggle heralded the emergence of four shambling figures, dressed in faded finery, and one strutting popinjay behind them, his top hat obvious even at this distance. He was carrying his usual leather medical case, full – Perdita was certain – of the choicest parts of the late serfs of Mulestop.

"Perdita!" Seamus crowed, doffing his hat and bowing with a sarcastic sweep. "Always a pleasure, my dear conchita, to pass the time of day with you. And you have brought la familia. Or, at least, the ones still sane enough to recognise you. I would ask my belles to offer their services to your menfolk, but I fear my girls might catch something. You understand."

While the be-suited murderer of Mulestop was raving, the unfortunate women under his command were stumbling forward, limbs askew, parasols waving jerkily and filthy bonnets whipping this way and that as their lifeless eyes tried to fix on the Ortegas. Perdita recognised one of them, clad not in harlot's hose but in tattered black lace, her staggering gait combining with her undead corpulence to set her putrefied white flesh quivering like jellied eels left too long in the sun – Madame Sybelle.

"Nino! Gracias a Dios!" exclaimed Santiago, slapping his younger brother on the back. "I think we've finally found you a mamacita who smells worse than you do!"

Before a furious Nino could get his hands on his brother's neck Perdita snapped an order at him. "The blacksmith's forge, Nino. Now! I want you up there with your rifle. Give 'em hell." She glared at Santiago before ordering him and Francisco to hold their ground. "Papa," she said, taking his hand from her hair. "It is time, papa."

Her father started to hop from one foot to the other, the insane light in his blue eyes mirrored in the subtly wrong shades of the noon sky overhead. Perdita unwrapped her clay cinder pot and handed it the man the rag sheets called Papa Loco, the embers inside glowing a dull red.

Snatching it with a howl her father raced off towards Seamus and his monstrosities. A fiery hiss told Perdita he had already lit one of his precious sticks of dynamite from the pot. He was probably going to wind up badly hurt, maybe even dead, but every Ortega knew that the only thing more important than family was business, and there was no place for sentiment in either.

Perdita moved away among the trees.

Seamus was staying back, but the belles, along with Madame Sybelle, had reached the centre of town, a well-trodden dirt square surrounded by the tumbledown buildings and shacks. Papa Loco was nearly on them as Nino squatted on the edge of the blacksmith's roof, drawing a bead on the nearest rotting harridan with his priceless repeating rifle.

Perdita narrowed her eyes. Overeager as ever, Nino was a little too close to the edge.

The nearest undead harlot stopped abruptly and raised its lifeless gaze towards Nino, employing whatever twisted version of its former charms Seamus had endowed it. It gestured once, twice in a grotesque come hither and – with Perdita's warning shout of "Cuidado!" just leaving her lips – Nino stood up and took a single step forward.

From the heavy thud, Perdita knew that her youngest brother would be taking no further part in the fight. Seamus would pay.

Her father was surrounded by the shuffling zombies – there would never be a better time to gain the upper hand. Without a moment's thought she raised her voice, using the fearful tone that cowed her brothers and that made even strangers obey her commands. "Now, Papa! Take 'em with you!"

But the wind had picked up, and her voice never reached the capering madman.

Cursing, she whipped out her Peacekeeper and put a .44 slug into the festering ruin that was Madame Sybelle. The former brothel keeper staggered slightly, but stayed on her feet.

Perhaps Papa Loco had heard Perdita's shout after all, or perhaps he was just reacting to the sight of putrescent belly fat erupting from Madame Sybelle's gross circumference, but suddenly he had four sticks of dynamite in his hands, the fuses sparking.

"Here ah come, Mama!" he yelled, hurling the sticks up in the air. For a moment they caught the sun and seemed to hang in the lilac sky, held aloft by the madman's cry.

The force of the blast punched a great bowl of dust in the air, hiding Perdita's father and Seamus' minions alike. The shockwave was so strong it knocked leaves from the trees and sent Perdita's hair whipping around behind her. When the dust settled, she was astonished to see that they were all still standing, although they were so caked in dust it was hard to tell who was who.

And then one ash-white figure raised a shaky arm with a battered parasol clenched in its fist and lashed out, striking at what must be her father. She heard the cinder pot shatter under the blow – imagined the red-hot coals scattering over her father's collection of dynamite-

The second blast was just as powerful as the first, the dust cloud rising to veil the sun. It drew back before the rising wind, revealing carnage. Where Madame Sybelle, the two cesspool strumpets and her father had been was nothing more than a slaughterhouse sump, broken shards of bone projecting from indeterminate clumps of flesh and rags of dust-streaked cloth.

"Vaya con Dios, Papa," Perdita whispered. It was the end he would have wanted, going out with a bang surrounded by women whose inhibitions were as low as their virtue, and he had certainly given the Ortegas the edge. "Seamus! Looks like your belles caught something, after all!"

But the Ripper of Redchapel was already darting forward, giggling his high-pitched laugh. "Victory is what you make of it, mi chonchita," and with a snarl of displeasure Perdita realised what he was up to. Into that stinking sack of his went what looked like a spine, still with ribs intact, trailing scorched gizzards. More blackened chunks of former zombie followed until his sack was bulging at the seams. Was it a trick of Malifaux's otherworldly light, or was it moving?

While Seamus was doing this, his last remaining intact belle – the one who had lured Nino to his untimely end – shambled towards Santiago and ripped at him with her broken nails and gleaming white teeth. Santiago, however, kept her at arms length with the blades on his brace of Peacekeepers, scoring deep gouges in her pasty flesh that seemed to do her no harm, but stopped her from reaching him.

Leaving the zombie to Santiago, Francisco lined up Seamus in his sights, trying to stop him bringing forth another horror from his sack. Seamus, however, was a slippery customer and not even Francisco's keen eye could find a telling shot. He had to settle for a flesh wound that troubled Seamus not at all.

With a cry of triumph Seamus emptied his bag on the packed dirt, and from the steaming pile of remains came the sound of bones cracking and flesh seething.

"Arise!" he giggled, "Arise, my sweet!"

Slender arms emerged with a cracking sound, planting themselves on the ground and heaving a steaming bulk of innards aloft. Flesh sloughed upwards from the pile beneath, wrapping itself around the mass as bones jerked into life and impaled the meat. Legs sprouted from beneath as pale skin stitched itself across the whole. The figure stood, tottering, but whole. Seamus reached down and picked something up from the blood-soaked dirt. He put his hand up to the zombie's face and when it came away, two brown eyes blinked at Perdita. With a cackle, Seamus whipped a length of pastel coloured lace bodice from his bag and draped it over her. "Cover yourself, my dear. What will the gentlemen think?" He stepped back, admiring his handiwork. "Oh, yes. Nearly forgot. Kill the gentlemen."

As this fresh horror stumbled towards Francisco on unsteady legs, Seamus strode forward, drew his enormous flintlock pistol and fired at Santiago. He clearly didn't care whether he hit his own belle or not, but whether it was luck or some infernal power of Seamus, the .50 calibre shot hit Santiago. It would have sent any other man to his knees, or even the grave, but not Santiago, whose fury at Seamus was only fuelled by the pain of his wound.

Ignoring the claws of the belle with a contemptuous snarl, Santiago levelled both pistols at Seamus. Shot after shot rang out and not even Seamus' necromancy could hold his body together under such an onslaught. Santiago laughed as he fired again and again and, when his chambers ran dry, his brother Francisco took up the task without hesitation, ignoring the undead horror reaching out for him to try and put an end to Seamus once and for all.

But not even his Peacekeeper could finish the job. Bloody and staggering, Seamus was, however, on his last legs.

"Leave him to me!" Perdita hollered, raising her own custom Peacekeeper before the sounds of Francisco's last volleys had faded away. The Ortegas were as close-knit as any family could be, and part of their deadly reputation came from their ability to work together so tightly that no foe of theirs had even a moment to react.

"Your powers are spent, murderer. And they have bought you only justice," Perdita said, as she fired.

Even the wind stopped for a moment as Seamus' body hit the dirt and lay, unmoving.

But la familia Ortega were not out of the woods yet. Screaming their anger for their lost master, the two hideous harridans launched themselves at Santiago and Francisco. Already badly wounded, Santiago was the first to fall. Francisco managed to kill one with a point-blank pistol shot between the eyes, but even as he did so the other was clamping its teeth around his neck. Blood fountained red across the pale dirt, as the last rotten belle closed in on Perdita.

Anyone else would have quailed. Many would have run. Most would have sobbed and begged for their lives, but Perdita was cut from a different cloth. For all its strangeness and danger, she had found herself in Malifaux. It had got under her skin and it flowed in her blood. All she had to do was embrace it.

"You disgust me. Begone!" It was that tone again, the one she had used growing up to bring her brothers to heel and her father back from the brink – the one that Malifaux had taken and turned into something different.

There is only ever one look on a zombie's face, so the look of shock that it displayed as it found itself turning around and walking away from Perdita was quite something to behold. As was the red mist when Perdita's .44 bullet exploded its skull from behind.

The day went to the Ortegas. Or rather, Perdita, mused, what was left of them. Still, business was business and, if there was one thing you could say about Malifaux, it was that there was always something surprising just around the next bend.

***

This was my first ever game of Malifaux, using the Ortega Gunslingers against my pal's Redchapel Gang. No doubt there are a tonne of things we forgot or got wrong, and I know we didn't use half of Seamus' powers, but it was a fun game and it lasted about an hour and a half.

Here is how it went:-

Setup: 3' x3' table. A clear centre, with a forest and a blacksmiths on my side and a dry goods store and a church on the other side:-

Turn 1

Initiative: Ortegas

Nino climbs up on the blacksmiths roof, Papa Loco charges forward and Perdita moves through the woods to get line of sight. Perdita tries to use Obey on Papa Loco, but fails, so shoots at Madame Sybelle instead.

Rotten Belles and Madame Sybelle advance. It takes two of the Belles to do it, but they finally lure Nino off the roof, killing him.

Turn 2

Initiative: Redchapel

Papa Loco activates Take Ya With Me, doing serious damage to himself and three enemy. A Rotten Belle then hits him, killing him and he goes BOOM. Madame Sybelle and two Belles are killed, leaving four corpse tokens behind.

Seamus runs forward and picks up two corpse tokens while the remaining Belle advances.

Francisco and Santiago shoot at Seamus, forcing him to burn through some of his eight Soulstones.

Turn 3

Initiative: Redchapel

Seamus makes a new Rotten Belle and he and his two Belles get close to Santiago and Francisco (Perdita is still off to the left in the woods, acting as support).

Seamus wounds Santiago, activating Is That All You Got.

Santiago, Francisco and Perdita then use Companion to activate and all three shoot at and kill Seamus. Santiago gets Trigger Happy off, which helps, and the two brothers between them manage to force Seamus to use up his remaining Soulstones, so when Perdita takes over, he has nothing left in the pot.

The two Belles wound Santiago and Francisco

Turn 4

Initiative: Redchapel

The two Belles kill Santiago and Francisco, although Francisco manages to kill one of them first using Fannin'.

Turn 5

Initiative: Ortegas

Perdita uses Obey to make the last Belle move 4" away and then shoots her, killing her.

We didn't bother with VPs since this was our first game and we were just playing to test the rules, but it was a close thing. It looked as if the Redchapel's miscalculation in clustering around the charging Papa Loco would end things early, but Seamus proved just how tough he is, sticking around under heavy fire to make new Belles and provide for a very close end game.

We had some decent terrain, but by placing it around the edges like that it actually played little part in the game. We'll make sure and change that for our games tonight.

Hope you enjoyed this

Edited March 16, 2010 by Sholto

[alemon]

The writing was well done

I've been wanting to write up one of my battle reports, now I'm more willing than ever.

[pancake ss]

Sounds like you had a great time, very nice batrep:viking:

[Sholto]

Thanks

I've put another batrep up - very different, this one's done as a slideshow.

[perplexiti]

Great write up man, brilliant to read.

[Ender101]

Excellent report, great style and I loved the story segment.

[Sholto]

Thanks, guys. Glad you liked the writing - I love trying to bring these games alive

Sholto

[razide]

Thanks for the BR. It was very exciting and vividly cinematic particularly the re-creation of a rotten belle.

Like the name Mulestop it has a lot of character.